Marie: Hey
it’s Marie Forleo and you are watching MarieTV, the place to be to create a business and life
you love, and this whole shindig is Q&A Tuesday. Today’s question comes from Kristin, and
Kristin writes: “Hi, Marie. I know that I have the talent to make it big
with my business, and yet my business challenge is my introverted nature. I'm contemplative and a great observer, and
that’s a strength with my photography, but not so much with putting myself out there. The classic artist syndrome of good art and
bad marketing. Too many business for introvert articles I've
read imply that we would have fit the go-getter mold in order to succeed. I find it hard to believe that I have to change
my nature so fundamentally. Are there ways to work the room that don’t
drain the life out of us introverts? Thanks again, Marie, you are creating exactly
what your gifts and talents are made for.” Kristin, this is a question that we hear over
and over again so you are so not alone. We get tons of emails about it and I hear
it all the time in B-School. So to answer that question today, I have the
world’s best expert to help me A this Q. Susan Cain is the author of the award winning
NY Times bestseller Quiet, the Power of Introverts in a World that Can't Stop Talking, which
is being translated into over 30 languages and was named the #1 book of the year by Fast
Company. Quiet was a subject of a Time Magazine cover
story and her writing has appeared in the NY Times, the Atlantic, the Wall Street Journal
and many others. Her record smashing Ted Talk has been viewed
over 5 million times and was named by Bill Gates as one of his all time favorites. She's an honors graduate of Princeton and
Harvard law school and lives in the Hudson River Valley with her husband and two sons. Susan, thank you so much for being here on
MarieTV. It is such an honor to have you here on the
show. Susan: Thank you so much for
having me. I love your show. Marie: So
the first thing I want to talk about, and this is probably something that not a lot
of people know, but you and I discussed when we talked on the phone is that I actually
have a lot of introverted qualities and that’s why I was so excited to talk to you today. Most people don’t realize it but even though
I do this, it’s like when I travel or go speak at a seminar or do anything, I need
a lot of downtime when I come home, and even in my personal life, I actually prefer very
small intimate get togethers like two, three or maybe four people versus big parties. I know you were quite shocked to hear that. Susan: It’s so funny because
I was shocked when you first told me, and this was in the phone conversation that we
had, and then I hung up the phone and was like “what were you so surprised for,”
because people tell me this all the time. I find the most unlikely people tell me that
either they're introverts or just that they're extroverts who feel like they wish they could
have more downtime than our amped up society gives anybody. Especially people who are in the media the
way you are, media is filled with introverts, so I sat on a panel recently and it was Candice
Bergen and George Stephanopoulos and all these other people who were really there out in
their daily lives; they all said they're complete introverts. I think that’s one of the interesting things
because I just think so many introverts learn from a very early age to act more extroverted
than they really are, so if you really are an introvert, you go around thinking that
you are the only one who has these needs to get away sometimes, and that there’s something
wrong with you for having them and you don’t realize that half the population feels the
exact same way. Marie: That’s
amazing. Your work is reaching millions and it’s
so important and I think one of the things that struck me the most about you, and it
gave me chills when I read it, is that you really see this like a civil rights movement
in its own way. Tell us more about that. Susan: I really do. I believe that introverts today are more or
less where women were around the 1950s or 1960s. You have this group that makes up probably
half the population; studies say that it’s anywhere from a half to a third of the population
is introverted. That’s half the population that is feeling
discounted because of this trait that goes to the core of who they are and just the way
we were with the women’s movement in the 1950s or 1960, we’re at the start of this
big profound consciousness raising in terms of getting people to notice that there is
this bias towards extroversion. The other thing that’s great about the analogy
is men are great; sexism is a problem, so same thing here. Extroverts are wonderful; the problem is only
that we have this bias that tells everyone that they have to be an extrovert whether
they are or not. We’re at the start of this big consciousness
raising but I believe in the next decades to come, we’re going to start seeing real
impactful concrete changes in the way our schools are run and the way our businesses
are run and in the way people think about themselves and their psyches. Marie: What
I love about you too is that you wrote this book, you're doing this work and you had shared
with me that you had a real fear of public speaking of letting yourself out there. Tell us about that. Susan: Of all the people you
have met in your entire life, you’ve never met anybody as terrified as I once was at
public speaking; that’s the only way I can think of to describe it. The silver lining to it was I couldn’t eat
before giving a speech so I would always lose 5 or 10 pounds before I do a speech and I
couldn’t sleep the night before; it was always this horrendous experience. What happened for me was that my book was
coming out, this was in 2012, and I really deeply, passionately, cared about what I was
saying in the book and I knew that to be able to promote it, I was going to have to give
talks. I embarked on what I called My Year of Speaking
Dangerously where I practiced public speaking every chance that I could, and I started in
very small, very safe, very supportive environments, which by the way is what you have to do. It does not work to just throw yourself up
in a big high stakes stage situation; you have to start small. Marie: I
love that too. That’s how I did it. I remember my first workshops when I was a
life coach. There were three people in the room, my yoga
and my parents and a pet. Susan: You really do have to
do that, and then this magical thing happens after a while where you start to become desensitized. It used to be to me was just a primal horror
to have all these people looking at me and I just don’t really feel it anymore, little
by little by little. Marie: That’s
awesome, so its almost like you build up stamina, you build up your strength and you're able
to handle it. I know for me all that energy looking at you,
and most of it is always really good, people generally tend to want to see a speaker succeed,
they’re excited to hear what you have to say. I love that. Susan: I think on that point
one of the other important things for a nervous speaker is actually to train themselves to
look at the people in the audience who do look happy about what you're saying because
there are always going to be people who are bored or sleepy or disgruntled or whatever
they are, and nervous speakers tend to focus on the disgruntled people, and then that makes
me feel bad about what they’re doing, and so you can train yourself over time to focus
on the positive. Marie: I
love what you said there because I think its something that whether you consider yourself
an extrovert or an introvert or anywhere on that spectrum, I think we tend to do that
in our whole lives. For example, even with MarieTV or maybe even
book reviews, I don’t know if you’ve seen this, but it’s like so many people can say
great things or have found value or have some kind of awesome dialogue with you about a
creation, but then the one stinker that may not even be a piece of useful critical information
but it could be mean-spirited or just at a left field or maybe it hits personal where
it gets you in a sore spot, and that’s the thing that your mind hangs onto; it’s the
place that you focus and then you're done for a little while. Susan: That’s so true and I
actually think that one of the great things about being out there online and having those
things come to you mediated through a computer screen is that you can train yourself to deal
with those things in the privacy of your own home; you can take five minutes to be like
“okay, that hurt for a moment and now I'm moving on.” I find you can take that practice into your
real life also, your offline life. Marie: Are
you cool if we get into some practical tips? Again, I love your book by the way. For anyone who has not read Quiet, you have
got to get your hands on this book and read it immediately. It is awesome and Susan also has more cool
stuff coming out that we’re going to tell you about at the end of the show. The first point, we’ve got a few points
to share with you all, but the first point which I really really love was something in
your book and it was like a broad stroke and it was so simple yet so profound. You talked about choosing your business or
your career wisely. Susan: It’s really important. People, when they are thinking about their
career or evaluating a potential employer, they think about health insurance, they think
about what will my office look like, they think about their salary and they don’t
tend to think about whether the job or career is going to be a good fit for their temperament. You really need to be thinking, if you're
an introvert, “is this a job that’s going to have me having to be on all day long or
is it someplace where the things that I love to do,” it could be photography or could
be the sitting and thinking deeply and strategizing, could be anything. You need to make sure you're choosing a line
of work that fits you. Also, I do think for everybody, introvert
or extrovert, the most important thing of course is to be doing the work that you're
super passionate about. Many introverts find themselves being passionate
about something that requires them to also be out in places that are beyond their comfort
zone. Like what happened to me, I spent seven years
happily writing a book in splendid solitude and then since then my life has been all about
being in public. What do you do with that? I think the answer there is you can act out
of character, and I'm drawing here in the work of the psychologist Brian Little who
talks about this all the time; you act out of character for the sake of work that you
really love, but you're doing it mindfully and as soon as you're done shooting your episode
or whatever it happens to be, you come back and you take a restorative niche where you
go into your own space and you have life working the way you want it to work. All of this has to come from a place of feeling
entitled to be that way. Marie: The
next point, which is genius, you talk about making a quota. Tell us about that. Susan: One of the things introverts,
like the women who wrote to you, struggle with all the time is this feeling, I have
this party invitation or a networking event, I really want to stay home but I might be
missing out if I don’t go. I would advise, instead of wrestling with
yourself every night for each of these invitations, come up with a quota system where you say
whatever it is, once a week I'm going to go to these networking events six times a month;
you pick what feels reasonable for you. You meet your quota system and then you don’t
have to feel guilty the rest of the time, and you also don’t have to agonize night
after night what you're going to do. Marie: I
love that and it goes to this idea I’ve been playing with lately which had been talked
about before but I’ve been seeing to come to life in my life is decision free living
for a certain spectrum. It’s emotionally taxing, it’s mental,
it’s like you go back and forth and I feel like your creative energy gets sucked out. Tim Ferris talks a lot about it in all of
his work and I was looking at it, I just did this detox not too long ago, and basically
it was regimented when I was eating, what I was eating and I was like “this is the
best thing ever.” It’s like I know what I'm doing and then
all of my creative energy can then be devoted to the things for me really matter. Making a quota; genius. Susan: I would also add to that
that you can use that kind of quota system if you find yourself in a relationship as
many people do where you're one introvert and one extrovert and I think this happens
all the time because introverts and extroverts are so attracted to each other. My husband’s an extrovert. You can come up with that kind of quota system
as a couple so that you're not always arguing about whether you're going to go out as a
couple or whether you're going to stay in. Marie: I
love that. Genius. Moving on. Number three. This was great and this was from your manifesto,
the power of one and the rule of thumb for networking events. Susan: Everybody tells you for
networking that your job is to work the room and you should emerge from every networking
event with a big fistful of business cards, and I say that is ridiculous. It works for some people but it’s ridiculous
as a “one size fits all” doctrine. You need to reframe networking in a way that
works for you. For me, when I think about networking, I don’t
even use the word network because I hate it; it sounds really machine like and cold to
me. I think in terms of kindred spirits, so I
go through the world looking for kindred spirits and there’s always at least one in every
party or any event, like the person who you really connect with; you really want to be
with them, you want to get to know them better, you want to stay in touch and usually at any
event, there’s many one such person who you have that kind of chemistry with and that’s
fine. Once you’ve met that one person, great. You go through life that way and now you’ve
got this gigantic collection of kindred spirits and I just find that a much more humane way
to live and also a more effective one. Marie: I
have to say I feel the same way. I was telling off camera Josh and I go to
a lot of social events; sometimes they’re movie premieres, sometimes it’s a big seminar
or a big event, and I always find myself going like “where’s one person and let me just
find one person I can have a great conversation with” that makes me feel more connected
in my heart, and it also takes the pressure off of me thinking I'm a bad networker. Susan: I'm really glad you said
that because the underlying theme to everything that we’re talking about today is take the
pressure off. All of these ideas, I'm a bad networker, I'm
not social enough, all of these things, these are ideas that are imposed on us culturally
and we don’t have own; we can reframe it all. Marie: Love
it. Point number four was about the power of partnerships
so tell us about that. Susan: I was thinking about this
when I was listening to the Q&A that came in because I believe that most business owners
are best suited finding a partner who is their temperamental compliment, an introvert looks
for an extrovert and vice versa, and also just in terms of skill sets. If you're the ideas person, you might need
a really grounded finance person. I can tell you I'm doing this now; I'm building
out a quiet revolution organization to develop tools for individuals and companies and schools
who want to help introverts draw on their own natural strengths instead of turning them
into extroverts. I have a partner in this venture, his name
is Paul Shabeta, he’s an old friend of mine and he’s a total extrovert to my introvert
and it makes life so much easier because I go on doing the things that I like to do,
writing and speaking and connecting, and he’s the one who very naturally picks up the phone
to strike up a deal with someone. Things that I could do but I would have to
push myself really hard to make them happen and for him it’s really easy. Why would you struggle like that instead of
just having each person be in the domain that they feel strongest with? Marie: I
can hear some of our audience going “I can’t find a partner,” I think even what you're
saying is surrounding yourself with person, even if they’re not “an official business
partner.” It might be someone you work with regularly
or someone you work with on your team, that you create somewhat of a support system around
yourself where everyone’s leveraging their strengths and honoring their own temperament. Susan: And that’s where I go
back to the kindred spirit thing again because if you collect that network of kindred spirits
then you're going to find those partners just naturally. Marie: I
love it. So beautiful. The final point, and I know this is my language,
this is not necessarily your language to everybody, it’s not Susan Cain’s not doing some ghetto
stuff like I always do, but I called it “when it’s time to fly, don’t deny.” I find it to be so fascinating because as
I was sharing, I feel this way sometimes so I’ll let you reveal what this strategy is
about. Susan: It’s just the idea that
everybody, when you are out in the world being on and being social, reaches their breaking
point. I know any time I go to a dinner party, it
always happens; I’ll be having a nice time and I’ve had my glass of red wine and everything
is good, then all of a sudden I hit this two hour mark and I'm like “I really want to
go home.” I look around and I'm like “does anybody
else feel this way” and no one appears to feel that way. I now know that many people feel that way;
they just aren’t saying so. I think you can train yourself in graceful
ways to extricate from those situations. I have a friend who does this beautifully,
she’s an introvert and she never says no really to any invitation; she always shows
and she always leaves really early, and you know what? It’s okay. I think I'm actually the only one who even
notices that she leaves early just because that’s my job but I don’t think anyone
else pays attention; they’re just happy that she’s there. Marie: I
love it because from a certain other framework, it’s like “leave them wanting more.” Susan: There's that too. Marie: You
show up, you make an appearance and you feel good for the time you feel good, but I know
for me, I have some really dear friends that we’ll spend time with, and when I’ve hit
the wall and these particular friends, you have to get a ferry to go to their house,
so it’s a pretty big ordeal, and if Josh isn’t ready to leave yet, I just tell them
“You know what, y'all, I’ve hit my wall, I’m gonna go hang out,” and they know
me, so they’re like “She’s not being weird, she’s not being rude; she just needs
to go hang out for a little while.” Sometimes if I’ve had enough of a break
I can then come back and re-engage, but I just think it’s so great for us to give
ourselves permission. I know for me in the past I’ve always felt
so guilty, “Am I being a party pooper? Am I being so selfish?” As we continue and go on and maybe start wrapping
up, one of the other things I love is the quote from Gandhi. Do you want to share that? Susan: The quote from Gandhi,
this is to me my motivating cry in life in general, he says, “In a gentle way, you
can shake the world.” I actually by the way thought of calling my
book Shake the World Gently, which I still love that idea but my editor said it sounded
like a memoir of growing up in the African savannah, so we didn’t go with it in the
end, but I love it. Gandhi really lived that way and he was by
the way incredibly shy and quiet and introverted. So much so that when he was a kid growing
up in school, he used to apparently run home from class every day as soon as his class
was over because he didn’t want to socialize with this classmates afterwards, and he remained
shy his whole life, but he did what he needed to do. He talks about it in his autobiography that
his shyness was his greatest source of strength. I think many quieter and shier people all
need to get in touch with that because once you start realizing that your shyness or your
quiet is connected also to sensitivity, powers of observation and all kinds of other powers
that you probably value about yourself, you start reframing the way you think about it. Marie: So
beautiful. I love this conversation. I know you have some really exciting projects
coming up and for everybody, we’re going to put links to everything below to know where
it is, but do you want to share a little bit about what you're creating next? Susan: Sure. We are developing this quiet revolution organization
and ultimately the suite of tools that we have will be I think quite enormous, but we’re
starting out with courses in public speaking for introverts and communication skills for
introverts, and again, the idea of these is not “we’re going to tell you how to be
this larger than life character on stage.” Instead, we’re going to be helping people
to be themselves on stage and make that really work. Marie: Susan,
thank you so much for being here today. I wanted to do this episode and I wanted to
have this conversation with you for so long and I am so grateful that you took the time
out to come to be with us today. Susan: Thank you so much. I'm so honored to be here so thank you for
inviting me. Marie: Susan
and I have a challenge for you. If you're up for it, the first thing is if
you consider yourself an introvert, which of the strategies that we shared today resonates
most for you and why? If you don’t consider yourself an introvert,
perhaps you have someone in your life who is, maybe it’s family member or a colleague,
and what today resonated for you and how can you perhaps approach the people that you love
in a more loving and powerful way? We would love to hear about it in the comments
below. If you liked this video, like it, subscribe
and share it with your friends, and if you want even more great resources to create a
business and life that you love, plus some personal insights from me that I only talk
about in email, get your buns over to MarieForleo.com and sign up for email updates. Stay on your game and keep going for your
dreams because the world does need that special gift that only you have. Thank you so much for watching and we’ll
catch you next time on MarieTV.
